Panel recommends curbside bin trash collection in Northborough

A recommendation by the Solid Waste Advisory Committee, if acted on, could mean trashing pay-as-you-throw bags in favor of a curbside bin system for waste and recycling removal.

Abby Jordan/Daily News staff

A recommendation by the Solid Waste Advisory Committee, if acted on, could mean trashing pay-as-you-throw bags in favor of a curbside bin system for waste and recycling removal.

Giving its final report to the Board of Selectmen last night, the committee recommended the town move from the bags to a "tote" system using wheeled bins for both trash and single-stream recycling.

That change could come as early as fiscal 2010, said selectman and committee member Fran Bakstran.

"We don't recommend continuing with the bag program," Bakstran said.

The advisory committee met more than 20 times in the last year to evaluate solid waste programs to recommend how to improve, enhance and change the current system.

The bag system, adopted in 2003 to eliminate trash funding from the tax base and encourage recycling, has been a success, according to the committee's report. Recycling has increased from 31 percent to 37 percent while the amount of trash placed curbside has been cut by one-third.

However, 14 percent of households have chosen private haulers, citing the inconvenience of buying the special bags, the bags' propensity to tear, the program's cost to those with large volumes of trash and displeasure with the town for switching programs without consulting residents.

"The biggest complaint I hear around town revolves around the bags," said Selectman Jeff Amberson. "They're inconvenient and the bags break."

The advisory committee evaluated alternatives to bags, including eliminating municipal trash collection, establishing a landfill, creating a transfer station and adopting a tote system for curbside collection.

Eliminating municipal collection was dropped from consideration because a 20-year contract with Wheelabrator-Millbury Inc., effective January 2008, would cost upward of $200,000 a year, on top of any alternative, until the contract could be terminated after 10 years at the end of 2017.

"We took that off the consideration list pretty quickly," said committee member Brian Harrigan, who, with Scott Mahoney, presented the committee's findings.

A landfill is not viable, according to the report, because of environmental regulations and the town not having enough land to create one.

Creating a transfer station was a more viable alternative, Mahoney said, albeit an expensive one.

While a transfer station would offer flexibility in terms of disposing materials, encourage recycling and swapping items and be a central meeting place for residents, the committee found it would cost more than $1 million a year to run.

That cost does not include buying the land, equipment or structures necessary to build a transfer station, Mahoney said.

"There were many positives to the transfer station, but it appeared to be very expensive," he said.

The committee recommends the town work toward moving from pay-as-you-throw to the tote system with its hauler, P. Pellegrino Trucking Co. Inc.

Committee members believe curbside collection using separate bins for trash and recycling could bring the 14 percent who contract with private haulers back to the town program.

Single-stream recycling would be easier for residents because they would not have to sort items. Placing trash in a bin could eliminate frustration over the special bags and be easier to place at the curb.

In Holden, a similar-size town that uses a tote system, residents pay $15 a month to use a 96-gallon recycling bin and 65-gallon trash bin, or $11 a month for a 65-gallon recycling bin and 35-gallon trash bin, Harrigan said.

Shortcomings of the tote system, the advisory committee found, are a loss of economic incentive to recycle, an increase in cost for those who generate less waste and that only one company, Casella Waste Management, currently provides single-stream recycling.

"Until there is some competition, going out to bid does not make sense," said Town Engineer Fred Litchfield.

Buying or paying to use totes could also be a considerable cost, Harrigan noted.

The report is available online at the town's Web site, www.town.northborough.ma.us.

(Abby Jordan can be reached at 508-490-7461 or ajordan@cnc.com.)

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